Not In My Backyard, You Don’t *Open Thread*

While Obama has been busy, busy, busy on his vacation, he has been getting his minions like Rep. Nancy Pelosi to try and shore up support for the horrendously bad Iran deal. Yes, the deal that allows Iran to inspect itself (!!!!) is being touted as the ONLY choice between war and not-war, a false choice if ever there was one. And it is all part of Obama’s “Legacy” building.

Another piece of Obama’s “Legacy” building that is getting lost a bit in the shuffle between the bad Iran deal, All-Trump-All-The-Time (really? “Trolling” Megyn Kelly and calling her a “BIMBO”?? THIS is the man people want in the White House??), and the massive Stock Market adjustment, is Obama’s latest great idea for Gitmo detainees.

You may have heard that the Obama Administration is looking at TWO different State-side locations to house terrorists. One is Fort Leavenworth in Kansas, and the other is a Naval brig in North Charleston, SC.

Here is what I don’t get. Back in 2009, Congress made it VERY clear that they would not fund the closing of Gitmo:

[…] On May 20, 2009, as part of a war-funding request, the Senate voted 90 to 6 against appropriating $80 million to close Guantanamo. “Americans don’t want some of the most dangerous men alive coming here,” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said on the floor of the chamber, adding that he commended Senate Democrats for “fulfilling their oversight responsibilities.” […] (Click here to read the rest.)

No kidding we don’t want these jihadists here on our shore. That this Administration is even considering this, putting our people at risk to fulfill Obama’s Legacy, is obscene.

It is just such a consideration that led Senators Pat Roberts (R-KS) and Tim Scott (R-SC) to pen an Op-Ed for the Wall Street Journal on the folly of such an idea. When it comes to Charleston, it is downright idiotic. Okay, the good Senators didn’t say that, but I am not as politic as they. First up is the concern about Kansas from WSJ:

[…] But throughout his presidency, Mr. Obama has prioritized personal legacy over the safety and security of the nation—and he is still pursuing an effort to move the terrorists at Guantanamo into our backyards.

The notion that Kansas, South Carolina or any other state would be an ideal home for terrorist detainees is preposterous. Transferring these prisoners to the mainland puts the well-being of states in danger, posing security risks to the public and wasting taxpayer dollars. The detention facilities at Guantanamo are doing a fantastic job of holding these terrorists.

Closing Guantanamo Bay isn’t taking the fight to the enemy; it’s bringing it home. Of serious concern is that there is no way to control who the terrorists would attract to our communities. We should be doing everything possible to destroy homegrown terrorism, not encouraging it.

Fort Leavenworth is on the Missouri River, adjacent to a public railroad, about 16 miles from Kansas City International Airport, in the middle of communities Leavenworth and Lansing, surrounded by schools and homes. Fort Leavenworth trains the best and brightest through the Army University, at the Command and General Staff College.

Everyone in the vicinity would live with a target on their back if some of the most dangerous terrorists in the world were housed among them. Millions of taxpayer dollars would need to be spent to retrofit the barracks—and acquire perhaps 2,000 acres of land around them by eminent domain for a security perimeter—to house these prisoners.

Exactly. That is exactly it. EVERYONE in that area would have a big ol’ bullseye on their backs. The entire area would be at grave risk by those who wish to do us harm.

And the same for the Charleston Naval Base:

Charleston’s Naval Consolidated Brig was built in the late 1980s as a medium-security military prison for prisoners serving sentences of 10 years or less. It is surrounded by residential neighborhoods, less than a mile from a school, close to the Port of Charleston, roughly five miles from the Charleston International Airport, and surrounded by military facilities.

It is also a short distance from the Space and Naval Warfare Systems Command, or SPAWAR, Systems Center Atlantic, and the Navy Nuclear Power Training Command. Both of these strategic military installations are vital to national defense and military readiness and would further raise the profile of the area as a target for terrorism.

Housing some of the world’s most dangerous prisoners next to Charleston, a city repeatedly named the No. 1 tourist destination in the U.S. by readers of Conde Nast Traveler, would be grossly irresponsible.

Congress has consistently stopped the president from closing Guantanamo by prohibiting funds from being used to transfer or release detainees into the U.S. Changing this policy would be beyond foolish. As the threat of Islamic State grows, now is not the time to consider transferring detainees to U.S. soil and putting America’s security at even greater risk. […] (Click here to read the rest.)

Without a doubt this would put our nation at great risk, especially areas like Charleston, a port city and a HUGE magnet for tourism. Come to think of it, to throw some terrorists being housed here – at more expense to the American people since the Brig would have to be upgraded – is more than idiotic. It is insane.

I have never seen a President of the United States so willing to put his own people at risk for his own political legacy. I could have lived my whole life without ever doing so gladly.

The bottom line is this: we built Gitmo to hold these extremely dangerous terrorists where we did for a reason. We have already spent a TON of money on this facility. To empty it now to bring terrorists to our shores INTENTIONALLY is lunacy enough, but it will also be financially costly as well. It is a stupid idea, one the Congress sure as hell better squelch in a BIG way.

54 Responses to “Not In My Backyard, You Don’t *Open Thread*”

I think the very idea of bringing Jihadists into this country is idiotic. And if the liberals want them here put them in their back yard. How about a facility right outside Chappaqua in New York State? New York is a blue state they should be happy to have Jihadists for neighbors.

Or how about right outside Washington D.C. D.C. is a very blue city and they too should welcome Jihadists into their neighborhood.

Funny that the two sites being talked about are both in “red’ states. Think that was an accident?

Oh, that’s a GREAT idea! They like illegal aliens there so much, put them in Alcatraz!! Ahahahahaha – good one!

One comment I saw suggested they put them wherever it is Obama plans to put his Library. Teehee!

And Marge, no, I don’t think it is one bit an accident to answer your rhetorical question. Of COURSE they want to put them in Red States. Remember that our Governor spoke up to Obama early on, telling him she wanted the state’s money back for the failed nuclear waste plan. So yeah – he has been going after this state ever since.

Ironically, Charleston is a Democrat city, though North Charleston is where Walter Scott got shot, so maybe that is their logic there.

It is most definitely idiotic, short-sighted, ill-advised, unwise, and downright DANGEROUS to consider bringing terrorists to these shores intentionally.

That doesn’t surprise me. He is a smart man, and he doesn’t resort to insults to win supporters.

Btw, Sen. Scott is having all of the Republicans come to SC for Town Hall events. Suzy and I are attending one that will be in Charleston on 9/7. Sen. Marco Rubio will be joining Sen. Scott and Rep. TREY GOWDY. I’d go just for Gowdy and Scott, though since it is here and everything, I thought it would be good to hear Rubio answer questions in a smaller forum. Should be interesting!

Right now its headed up again. The thing that concerns me is the volatility and the fact that all those in the know, know that the markets need a correction. If it can so slow and steady not too much damage will be done to the country as a whole. If the bottom drops out…

My guess is that the warning of the past week will be ignored by the majority of politicians.

Remember how often conservatives talked about how petty Obama is? Well those “conservatives” that support Donald Trump must be appalled at his pettiness in attacking Megyn Kelly on her return from her vacation. What a little man he showed himself to be.

One would think, Marge, but it seems that too many are willing to jump on the bandwagon. The same people who think Obama is petty and childish – and he is, as well as who LOVED when Megyn Kelly took it to Reps, are now jumping all over HER and defending HIM. It is just crazy, crazy, crazy…

How in the hell can anyone defend a grown man who is still attacking her? His pettiness is only one of the reasons I will NEVER vote for him. I loathe and despise him. I just loathe Hillary Clinton.

I cannot believe that people I thought had common sense and honesty are now willing to defend the same kind of behavior they thought was so terrible in Obama. Hypocrisy knows no party, race, gender or age. I am disgusted.

Oh yes, at the end of it all is that Trump will go ahead and push 3rd party. That will all but insure a Dem victory. These are comments I see over and over. Megyn is a minor detail in all of these “theories.”

Bill Kristol: I don’t know, good publicity… Seems like maybe it’s a little excessive. On the other hand, you know, people in the news business should… They say things about other people, they shouldn’t be too thin-skinned. I’m not really disturbed by it. I just think it’s antagonizing to a fair number of Megyn Kelly fans who you’d think Trump might want to have on his side…

mcnorman, that is EXACTLY what I have been seeing – that this is all abt Fox and the GOP who just want to take Trump down. Seriously? Trump is getting SO much unpaid for air-time, it is not even FUNNY. But yeah – those nasty old GOP hardliners don’t like Trump, so they are doing whatever they can to do in his candidacy.

As you said, he will just go third party anyway because he is a petulant child who has to have his way. Just like someone else we know.

It really is remarkable, isn’t it? Like his Immigration policy. Judge Napolitano said it would take FORTY YEARS to deport everyone after they each had a trial and appeal. FORTY YEARS!! How does anyone not see that as COMPLETELY unworkable? Something has to be done, no doubt abt it, but you sure cannot snatch American citizens out of the US and ship them off anywhere for starters, and the rest is just as unworkable.

I will say, though, abt this whole Immigration thing, whenever anyone mentions a plan, people start wringing their hands and talking abt the COST of it all. Just how freakin’ much do they think we are spending on ELEVEN MILLION ILLEGALS in this country already? Sheesh.

Living in a sanctuary city I can’t begin to tell you how the border areas suffer because of our porous borders. We have a county hospital that 15 years ago could not collect .02 on the dollar. The taxpayer supports the elephant because otherwise the other hospitals would have problems. Let me give you an example. We see third world disease in our public schools, one of the hospitals had a worker that tested positive in the nursery for TB. Guess where these people come from? Guess what…they also carry dual citizenship so it isn’t as if they are here illegally. I think that we need to be like Germany…choose your nationality at 18. If we educated you, be happy. Return to your country of choice. The truth is that the dems don’t want their voting base chased out of the country and the gop doesn’t want their gardners, waiters, etc. moved out either. Many are starved to work, a sorely missed work ethic when it comes to the generational entitlement families. We didn’t create this monster overnight and it is something that should be addressed but given the proper amount of time to correct. Trust me, you start telling people that they have to start paying (no entitlement) properly and they are out of here.

What a great comment, mcnorman! Suzy had said before when we were discussing this whole thing that the way to go abt the anchor baby situation was to give them dual citizenship, but make them go live in their mother’s country of origin until they are 18, then they can come here. But they cannot stay here and bring over every cousin, aunt, uncle, or distant relative to this country.

As for the illegals who are here, seems to me that they need to go to the back of the line for citizenship, but even before that, need to go through the proper channels to be here legally to work.

Citizenship in tis country is a PRIVILEGE, and should be treated as such. It is not something to be demanded by those who are here illegally. Yes, many are hard workers – no doubt abt it, but the DEMANDS and protests really irk me. That would never happen in another country, and it shouldn’t happen here.

Good point abt the illnesses coming in too, mcnorman.

Excellent comment – I swear, some day, if you are so inclined, I would love for you to write more abt all of this. 🙂

Good for Roger Ailes! And good for Brett Baier, Brian Kilmeade, Dana Perino, and Sean Hannity. About time someone put that fat-faced POS in his place.

How about the arrogance of Trump in telling Aisles about what kind of a journalist Megyn Kelly is. Aisles is the head of the highest rated news cable in the country. And Trump is going to tell him about the quality of his people? Hey Roger, throw the whiny little baby a pacifier and cross him off your list of guests.

That was one show. FOX leads in the ratings day after day and year after year. Megyn Kelly has very high ratings and sometimes tops O’Reilly who has been on top for about 11 years or thereabouts.

FOX was number one before Trump and will be number one after he’s gone. Conservatives who whine about the debate and vow to never darken FOX’s doorstep again are just kidding themselves. I don’t watch CNN or MSNBC because they insult my intelligence and lie day after day and year after year.

I watch some FOX sometimes. I am not joined at the hip to any of them. That’s why I DVR everything and then can watch only the parts of things I can tolerate.

Most of the “news” is just entertainment anyway. And I don’t find Trump entertaining. Never did. He’s a tacky little man who would be a total nonentity if he wasn’t so rich. He sure as hell wouldn’t be working on trophy wife number 3. He’s ugly, inside and out.

Excellent point, Marge – yes, Fox routinely leads the cable channels, and with good reason. Bret Baier, Greta van Susteren, and yes, Megyn Kelly, are three very smart, informed interviewers and excellent at their jobs. There is a reason why they picked Kelly in the first place to be one of the moderators: she is not cowed by anyone, including someone with as big a megaphone, as big a mouth, as bullying and intimidating as Trump is and tries to be. His attacking her the way he is is INCREDIBLY telling, and I am shocked that he has so many people behind him on that.

And Marge, one would HOPE they would tire of his braggadocio, but just like the Obama followers who giggled and acted like school children when he flipped Clinton off, they LOVE it. They laugh, they guffaw, they think it is HILARIOUS that he is sticking it to those asking real, legitimate questions of him.

And great cartoon below – yes, he is a big time flip flopper. But people who raked Obama over the coals for being a WORM now say it doesn’t matter what Trump used to say, it only matters what he says TODAY because they have FAITH (I kid you not, I have had people say that to me) that he will do what he says.WOW.

Can I just tell you that many people no longer watch Fox? It might have been one show, but the anger is quite prevalent. They are angry at the institutions that they perceive to have tuned them out. They were once considered the greatest generation and now, not so much.

I’m out in the sticks and people here just want to be heard. They are tired and they don’t care about Fox because they see them as a tentacle of the GOP. The time has come where the frustration level has become a hug problem. I do worry that these same people (the silent old majority) will do what they have in the past…not vote at all. They believe that they are disenfranchised so why bother? This scares me more than anything because we will certainly slide into further zeroland.

Good for Ailes,e t al., for standing up to this bully. He is WAY out of line.

And not for nothing, as mcnorman was mentioning above, Trump’s supporters keep hammering Fox, but FOX has given Trump so much air time on their prime time shows. If I was Ailes, I would stop that NOW until Trump can conduct himself with a bit more decorum. Put some of the other candidates on so we can hear what some ADULTS have to say what is going on these days. I’d rather hear from Fiorina or Cruz or Rubio or Walker ANY day of the week than that blowhard…

I would rather hear almost anyone, even Bush, and I really don’t find his brand of bland at all appealing, than Trump. Aren’t even his fervent supporters tired of his never-ending braggadocio? And talk about a flip-flopper!

I have 4 of the 5 in my cartoon “stash” file. I didn’t save the blue dress one. That’s always seemed a tad icky to me. I loved the “2016 Polls” on and of course the Trump flip-flopper is one I posted here. I do love cartoons!

I watched Jorge get the boot from the Donald. Jorge is from neck of the woods. After he left here, he turned into a diva. I gotta tell you alot of us were laughing hysterically. Jorge can be a big ass. I guess he finally met his match.

Just so you know, Jorge left this area to become Univision royalty in Miami. He never looked back. He was an incredible journalist, but he gave that up long ago. I ask now why Jorge will not do his job in Mexico where he is desperately needed to be the voice that people hears? That might mean that his family would be kidnapped by the cartels or suffer a worse fate. He could be talking about how his country has become so unstable that it now resembles a demilitarized zone. Instead, he tows the line for the Dems who want the vote of the very people that he said he would advocate for. Jorge was a man of his word at one time. Very sad.